


Camgirl Experiment

by cryforwhat, MFA101



Series: MFA's NaNoWriMo 2018 [2]
Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Ballet, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, And positive self-help process, Ballerina Rey, Ben Solo is crushing harder than a 12-year-old, Camgirl, Cat Ears, Cyberbullying, Cybersex, Daddy Kink, Devoted Reylo, Dirty Talk, Dominant Kylo Ren, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Crack, Foot Fetish, Geek!Ben, Kylo Ren Has Issues, Kylo Ren Needs a Hug, Lingerie, MOOC, Machine Learning AU, Mental Health Issues, Objectification, Praise Kink, Rey Needs A Hug, Self-Reflection, Sex Work, Software Engineering AU, Strip Tease, Submissive Rey (Star Wars), Sugar Baby, Sugar Daddy, The Author sort of turned the story into a Wikipedia Page, Virgin Ben Solo, Virgin Rey, Voyeurism, also let's pretend English is my first language, and burning money like a, and has food and dresses like a, camgirl!rey, evil overlord
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-21
Updated: 2018-11-21
Packaged: 2019-08-04 18:43:54
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 14,579
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16352105
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cryforwhat/pseuds/cryforwhat, https://archiveofourown.org/users/MFA101/pseuds/MFA101
Summary: Ben Solo's embarrassingly expensive six-month camgirl infatuations.Whenever u/renulator1138 logs in to Reddit at work, he has very explicit needs: CUNT.SEXY_SC4V3NG3R is open for business. Prepare your DICK.This Camgirl AU is inspired by seriousness'sDeep Learning.Trigger warning: This fic may prompt you to study programming languages, even if you hate maths or just in it for the crack.





	1. A Rake's Progress|A Harlot's Progress

**Author's Note:**

  * For [seriousness](https://archiveofourown.org/users/seriousness/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Deep Learning](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15546507) by [seriousness](https://archiveofourown.org/users/seriousness/pseuds/seriousness). 



> If you haven't read seriousness's "Deep Learning", you should definitely check it out first. It's a wonderful Canon retelling set in a Modern Software Engineer AU with lots of technical jargon and hilarious dialogues and in-character development. It's a masterpiece that I cannot recommend high enough. It even inspired me to take Python and Machine Learning lessons, that's how wonderful it is.
> 
> This story is based on Deep Learning. I've been haunted by it ever since I read it. It gave me so many feelings and ideas! Hopefully I can do justice to it by incorporating more elements from Deep Learning into this Camgirl AU. If you read this AU first, and then DL, you will have many "AWWW" moments.
> 
> _Exerpt from Ch4 of DL: "It had been a very long time since he had considered himself someone who wanted female companionship. He’d subsisted on a physical-satisfaction diet of angry, tense celibacy, occasional RedTube benders, embarrassingly expensive six-month camgirl infatuations, and very intense workouts."_
> 
> _Exerpt from Ch9 of DL: "My rent was set to increase at the start of last month and I was out of options for income. I figured it was either learn to code, go back to living on the street, or finally getting serious about sex work."_

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kylo Ren is not a people person.  
> Kira Rey is not a lucky person.

**esp1_4r4k3spr0gr3ss.exe**

Kylo Ren is not a people person. 

"I'm not anti-social, I just can't stand people," said the prodigy who'd probably written code before English, who'd only kissed one girl at a[ bat mitzvah](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bar_and_Bat_Mitzvah), who'd used high quality labeled satellite images to test an algorithm he was working on in his uncle's college, which freaked out Luke who closed the school altogether, thinking that his nephew was on some kind of slippery slope to global surveillance eyes in the sky, which was not impossible, given that Luke's father had worked in the [Manhattan Project](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manhattan_Project).

Evil genius runs in the family, apparently.

Ben Solo was not building a [Skynet](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skynet_\(Terminator\)), by the way. At least, not at the time. 

Now, specializing in image and video object detection, he is professionally known as Kylo Ren, the public face of the First Order AI “Division” which, let’s be real, is 85% just him, because he can't even handle having an intern, or a cup of joe. Everyone speculates that he always wears black so it doesn’t show when he spills coffee on himself. 

He has a really stressful job which he honestly hates guts, occasionally, he would spend time in the privacy of a bathroom stall in a building far from his desk, scrolling through his smartphone, reading [LinkedIn](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LinkedIn) recruitment messages and chickening out. Because he knows that he would never be able to leave the First Order, he owes Snoke a favor that he can never fully return, and also because that's where he can really change the world.

Then he begins to do something else to distract him.

Whenever u/renulator1138 logs in to [Reddit](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redditt) at work, he has very explicit needs: _**CUNT**_.

No, you perv. It means he frequents the following subreddits:

r/ **C** onspiracy  
r/ **U** nethicalLifeProTips  
r/ **N** otMyJob  
r/ **T** otallyNotRobots

Not that he really likes starting fights on politics in subreddits, he would post ridiculous conspiracy theories on [r/Conspiracy](https://www.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/) and then gets genuinely exercised about it when people don't believe them. 

Getting and sharing tips that improve one's life in a meaningful way, perhaps at the expense of others or with questionable legality on[ r/UnethicalLifeProTips](https://www.reddit.com/r/UnethicalLifeProTips/), is oddly satisfying. 

Seeing how shitty other people are at their jobs on [r/NotMyJob](https://www.reddit.com/r/NotMyJob/) makes him feel slightly less miserable about his own. After all, if he fucks it up, the shareholders will be calling for blood.

He trolls [r/TotallyNotRobots](https://www.reddit.com/r/totallynotrobots/) mostly to curb his [god complex](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God_complex). Also because he reckons if one AI woke up the first thing it would do would be to destroy the world, and they deserve it.

Obviously, developing high-technology autonomous weapon systems is a nerve-wrecking job. The deadline puts him under such high pressure that he has to let out some steam from time to time, that's why he often hits the gym, and of course, what better ways to decompress than write more code?

The night is dark and the light is dim. The glow of computer screens barely reaches his handsome face as lines of code flash by, spurred on by his clever long fingers. The only sound in his too empty apartment is the clacking of keys. The echo bounces around in Kylo Ren’s head as he works on his pet projects, drunk on the dopamine hit.

Besides writing more code, what keeps him up at night, though, is another  ** _CUNT_**.  And yes, this is when and where our Benny Boy gets naughty. 

 **C** onsciously, he has done his fair share of searching the web, visiting various [onion servers](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.onion) and ghost websites.  
**U** rls that are known for being there one moment and the next disappearing, always changing and moving.  
**N** one is good. All holds something dark. Underground societies, black markets, [red rooms and all that lies beyond.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_web)  
**T** hrough services such as [Tor](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tor) and his own expertise, he makes sure that his browser history is cleaner than Jesus's conscience.

He has managed to accumulate a large sum of [bitcoins](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitcoin), thanks to his participation in many sites such as these and more. He is a buyer and a vendor, with so many aliases, pseudonyms, personas, he has created a web so tangled that it is hard to see where he begins and where he ends. That's how deep he has fallen down the internet rabbit hole. He's too deep inside to pull out.

All right, maybe he's laying it on a bit thick. Why are there so many [Freudian slips](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freudian_slip)?

I mean, what else would he be doing at night? Watching porn?

Look, he is a socially awkward 30-something single male with a healthy libido and uncapped WIFI at night. Of course he would be watching porn. 

And with terse [Tensorflow API,](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TensorFlow) he can detect pornographic videos in a really short time, enough to chafe his cock for a lifetime.

He subsists on a physical-satisfaction diet of angry, tense celibacy, occasional [RedTube](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RedTube) benders, and very intense workouts.

But deep down, he still craves for spontaneous human interactions, specifically, companionship of the female persuasion. 

And that's why he's got those embarrassingly expensive six-month [camgirl](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Webcam_model) infatuations.

AKA, the pretty little pussy that's been keeping him up at night.

 

* * *

**esp2_4h4r10tspr0gr3ss.exe**

 

Kira Rey is not a lucky person. 

"Fuck my life," says the orphan who was abandoned in [Corona](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corona,_Queens) at the age of three by her parents who hadn’t left her with much more than a single name, who has never left the five boroughs of Queens her whole life, who has still managed to get a [GED](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Educational_Development) even though she doesn't have a high school diploma, and that's something that counts, though it cannot offer her a prosperous career.

A real polyglot, she has picked up French, Spanish, German, Russian and Cantonese and has taught herself to fake a British accent in uncomfortable social situations at a young age because she found people assumed she was smarter, older, and more sophisticated and independent when she sounded like that. The accent has come to her aid in many situations.

And now, she finds herself in yet another dilemma. And she is desperate.... for _ **DICK**_.

Okay, you must know that's NOT what you are thinking about by now.

[ **D** umpster-diving](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dumpster_diving) is not what she would call a healthy lifestyle, but right now that is what helps the little scavenger sustain her life since she cannot afford to buy new clothes or shoes, not to mention organic food, she's not picky. She knows which [food banks](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_bank) to go to on which days of the week. But she is still hungry all the time. And winter is coming.

 **I** t is so fucking hard to be poor in New York, and so much fucking harder to figure out how to go be poor someplace cheaper, or get better job opportunities. Even [the nearest community college](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queensborough_Community_College) from her place is a 45-minute bus trip away. She has done all sorts of low-paid shady contractor jobs, including rating and labeling tasks, speech transcription for IT companies, while using the [public library in Queens](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queens_Library).

 **C** orona is the shithole of a home that she has to stay. If her parents ever come back, they’d find her here, just where they’d left her so many years ago. If none of her other reasons are enough, well, her parents are enough. Because in her stubborn and even a little deluded mind, her parents would be the deus ex machina that shows up and fixes everything for her. 

 **K** eeping her life together is getting harder and harder by the day. She has a terrible little studio in a dilapidated building but at least she knows the neighbors are okay and sometimes the landlord gives her a break on rent if she does odd repair jobs that come up. She works really hard, to the point of exhaustion. But it's still not enough, she is late on bills. And the rent is going to increase soon. 

She doesn't want to live on the street, again, or even worse, to sell herself on the street.

And that's when she decides to become a webcam model, or camgirl, she figures selling her own body to strangers on the internet is better and "cleaner" than doing it on the street.

She's young. She's lean. She's got small tits, but tits are tits, and tits sell.

Being a camgirl at home means she can control her own surroundings and agency, without being touched by real people. When life really fucks you up, the best way to deal with it is to fuck yourself properly, right? 

She has done her research thoroughly first, of course, to know how to be a decent camgirl without some kind of enormous up-front investment, though the downside is she still has uncertain payoff years down the line.

Ironically yet very suitably, she concludes her "Survival Guide to Camming" with another _**DICK**_.

 **D** eciding on a reliable site. There are various cam sites, such as [LiveJasmin](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LiveJasmin), [MFC](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MyFreeCams.com), [CAM4](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CAM4) and so on. All of them have some sort of token system for viewers to award the performers. Most of these sites get a 40% cut. In the end, she chooses [Chaturbate](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaturbate), an adult website providing live webcam performances by amateur camgirls, camboys and couples typically featuring nudity and sexual activity ranging from striptease and dirty talk to masturbation with sex toys. The site is divided into such categories: featured Cams, female cams, male cams, couple cams and transgender cams. "Chaturbate" is a portmanteau of "chat" and "masturbate". Viewers are allowed to watch for free (with the exception of Private Shows), but pay money in the form of "tips" in order to see certain sex acts performed. It's easy to use without too fussy of a background check or an annoying rating system, and the site can pay her by check, which is great since her social security number and her ID are both fake.

 **I** mplements for camming. Picking up shifts in[ Unkar Plutt’s ](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Unkar_Plutt)dirty pawn shop has its perks, since she has years of experience replacing hard drives and tinkering with electronics of questionable provenance to make them harder to trace. It takes her some time to jury-rigged her beat-up laptop with a decent webcam and mic from various spare parts she's scavenged over the years. God bless Han Solo and his Democratic Computing Initiative that built those low-cost laptops for poor kids in New York. She's swapped in a new hard drive, new RAM, had to replace the touchpad but it still flies, fourteen years after they handed them out at the Boys and Girls Club. She finally figures out a way to get WIFI by replacing that custom low-power motherboard. Stealing WIFI from her neighbors is something she's not proud of, but she reads that [camming in the library is too risky](https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/windsor/webcam-model-streaming-sex-show-at-library-caught-in-act-1.2981531), and she intends to only do camming at night, and once she starts getting a decent income, she can pay for her own internet connection, and sex toys.

 **C** ompetitions are fierce. There are literally millions of pretty models in the camming business aiming to climb to the top. Yet there are kind ones who share experience and help each other. She learns from an old fetish female dom online that kinky and sexy costumes are always way cheaper after Halloween, so she gets a haul at a super low price in a thrift shop, and uses her deft hands to re-adjust the sizes and add ornaments. Since she doesn't really want to show her own face, she gets a black lace half-mask, which covers the upper part of her face and most of her freckles and it saves her a lot of time and money on makeup. Lipstick is so much easier to apply than mascara and fake lashes, not to mention drawing impeccable eyeliners and eyebrows, or doing contours and highlights, though she does need to learn how to make herself more presentable if she wants to stay on the job. So she practices in front of the mirror and camera a lot to find out her best angles and how to show off her "assets" in a seductive yet classy way. She's got some decent test shots ready to upload some well-watermarked teaser videos on [PornHub](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pornhub) and other social media sites, and she has got some exclusive shots and photo sets ready for sale before she begins to cam.

 **K** nowing her limits. Covering her face will reduce her popularity and profitability in some way, but she hopes her fake posh-accent will make people look past a little grime on someone who sounds like a rich lady from a movie, and maybe the mask will give her an air of mystery. And she has to face the fact that she has very little sex knowledge apart from watching porn and reading smut. She will not do anything she's uncomfortable with. She will always keep her privacy and safety her top priorities, so even if the viewers send her gifts from her [Amazon](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazon_\(company\)) Wishlist, the gifts will be delivered to a [PO box ](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-office_box)and be picked up in a discreet manner. They will never know where she actually lives or what she actually looks like. She will never have emotional attachment with any of her potential clients. And she doesn't intend to do camming in the long term. Once she's got enough money for her to stop worrying about rent and food, she will finagle her way into one educational scheme or another, such as enrolling in that Intro to Computer Science and Programming in Python at Queensborough Community College.

After all the preparations, SEXY_SC4V3NG3R is open for business. 

Little does she know that her first night camming will encounter a real big dick that may or may not change her game.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone, I'm Саша. It's my birthday today (10.20), so I post the first chapter earlier. 
> 
> You may have noticed that there are a lot of hyperlinks in this story. I want to keep my references as accessible as possible, and what is the best way to show this is a nerdy story? By turning it into a Wikipedia-like page of course. I also stash a lot of easter eggs here and there, so just click away!
> 
> In Deep Learning, seriousness alternates between the POVs of Rey and Kylo, and that's also what I'm trying to do here in Camgirl Experiment, I do two POVs in one chapter and try my best to make them parallel. This is an AU of an AU, is that a thing? Deep Learning is set around Sept '16 to early '17, this story is set even earlier than that. Most basic background materials of Ben and Rey come from DL's original text and seriousness's head-canon insight in the comment section, some of them are exactly the same. Seriousness uses past tense, but I use past and present tenses to describe the different phrases of their lives. Seriousness is also very gracious to let me use Kylo Ren's Reddit ID: u/renulator1138, [1138](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/1138_\(number\)) is an easter egg in George Lucas's works.
> 
> Kira Rey is the name used in Deep Learning. I think it parallels nicely with Kylo Ren. And the similarity between krey and kren is the reason they started a conversation in DL.
> 
> Nonetheless in my own head-canon, she is sometimes called Rebecca "Rey" Kira, I explained it in [Where the heart is](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14546694), my Bachelor Nation AU, which is full of hilarious Podcast and Youtube comments and social media beef. 
> 
> Have you ever tried to learn an alien language or a programming language for the purpose of writing a fanfic? Yes, I have. That's how weird I am.
> 
> In case you miss it, my episodes titles are specially styled like [that of Mr Robot's](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Mr._Robot_episodes) to get a "geeky" feeling.   
> esp1_4r4k3spr0gr3ss.exe ([A Rake's Progress](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Rake%27s_Progress))  
> esp2_4h4r10tspr0gr3ss.exe ([A Harlot's Progress](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Harlot%27s_Progress))  
> A rake is a john/gambler, a harlot is a hooker. William Hogarth painted both series to depict the grim side of prostitution and gambling. 
> 
> I originally titled this story "Camgirl Experience", but as I progress with the plot, this feels more like an experiment than an experience.
> 
> I love telling you all these tidbits, and hope that you will understand each and every easter egg as you read along.
> 
> A real big dick, hm? Who could that be? :wink
> 
> PS. I am allowed to insert a Chinese joke here and there since Chinese (including Cantonese) is my mother tongue. LOL.  
> This is written without a beta, so kindly point out any mistakes or typos, please.


	2. Evil Overlord|Femme Fatale

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kylo Ren is not evil, not in the traditional sense, anyway.  
> Kira Rey is not naive. She knows what it takes to be a successful camgirl.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I rewrote a lot of stuff, so here is the edited version.

**esp3_3vi10v3r10rd.ko**

 

Ben Solo was not evil.

He was one of those stereotypical 90s-kid: [ADHD](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attention_deficit_hyperactivity_disorder) and karate in elementary school, into [nu-metal ](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nu_metal)and black trenchcoats in middle school, got put on [Prozac](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fluoxetine) to mix with his [Ritalin](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methylphenidate) like everyone else he knew.

Yet he was also atypical, growing up in a house of coders, using [Scratch](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scratch_\(programming_language\)) before he could even read. The boy had become pretty tech-savvy, in a spine-chilling way. He was a wizard with action shooter and fighting video games such as [Battlefront I and II,](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Wars:_Battlefront_\(2004_video_game\)) whose protagonists are a starfighter and a knight templar. Some of the Battlefront levels he created can still be found online, known as the Solo levels. 

Though Han Solo never went near a console, he had spent a lot of time teaching Ben how to build electronics instead of how to chat up girls. The father and son had even signed up for a very hardcore Boy Scout troop in an abortive attempt to spend more time together doing manly activities in his early teens. After the ill-fated stint, those camping gears labeled with his name got stashed somewhere in their Brownstone house in Queens. Ben went on to be an alarmingly quiet, smart nerd. 

No wonder after the [Columbine High School massacre](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Columbine_High_School_massacre), suddenly every eye was on him.

Ben joined his uncle's newly-founded "College of the Future" a year and a half before high school graduation, just to get away from unpleasant speculations or jokes about him being another [Eric Harris](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_Harris_and_Dylan_Klebold), also because he was still too young to join the [Air Force](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_force) or the [Marine Corps](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marines) then.

After the fiasco with his uncle, he cut ties with his family, changed his name and moved to [Silicon Valley](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silicon_Valley), trying to turn over a new leaf. And now his job is deeply involved with the military, so everything comes full circle?

Kylo Ren is not evil, not in the traditional sense, anyway. 

He literally just parks his [Tesla](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla,_Inc.#Car_models) wherever he is so inclined and pays for parking tickets after the fact. All the First Order clean crew hate him because he throws half-filled coffee cups on random company properties, well, at least the HR division doesn't hate him that much since he has not actually splashed coffee on his ginger colleague.

Contrary to public belief or what [The Times](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Times) says, he doesn't hunt humans for sport, nor does he sleep in a coffin. And he has never ever kicked a dog. Whatever that article published on [Business Insider](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_Insider) is hogwash.

What the First Order's notoriously temperamental Managing Director of Artificial Intelligence and Data Mining can do, is beyond normal people's idea of evil-doing.

Have you ever heard of [UAV](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unmanned_aerial_vehicle), unmanned aerial vehicles? The drones that can deliver packages and take pictures? Sure, but remember, those are remote controlled by men.

What if those drones are embedded with AI to gain swarm cognizance, which means that they can achieve group accomplishment of strategic goal with no supervisory assistance? What if they can distribute tactical group planning, have individual determination of tactical goal, individual task planning and execution? What if they can do all those things in complex and intense environments, including on-board tracking, while they are equipped with deadly weapons? What if those autonomous weapons are deployed in battle space or civil society? 

Dystopian Skynet much?

At current stage, AI has already been out of its infancy, but it is still far from perfect, and thank god, still not fully autonomous, so mistakes will be made. But it is easier to tolerate mistakes made by human because human can be punished in a way that the victims and their families may think is meaningful or fair. How do you punish AI, though?

Developing autonomous weapon systems is a blood-curdling idea even if you only have half a brain. Though competitions, inevitability of technological advancements, and nationalism (“oh, because you want _China_ to get smart drones before _we_ do, is that it?”), especially after [9/11](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/September_11_attacks), make slightly better argument. Kylo Ren doesn't have any deep optimism about the tech itself. He knows where it will lead to. 

Let's just say, nowadays, a major part of his job is to collect and analyze data so as to make sure his prototypes don't shoot incorrect targets before he meets the hard deadline set by the [US Department of Defense](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Department_of_Defense), who signed a contract with the First Order.

Does he has a god complex and anger issues? Yes.

But he is not after world domination or god forbid, genocide. He wants to make sure the products he sells to the government are of better quality (aka making fewer lethal mistakes) than those made by his competitors.

He is a masterminded engineer writing algorithms to kill, not exactly your run-of-the-mill [Evil Overlord ](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evil_Overlord_List)with capital E and O. He's seen enough spy movies and he is sure he will definitely not [be watching some third-world rogue states crumble while stroking a pussy](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/DiabolicalMastermind).

Speaking of _pussy_ , a curl lifts up the corner of Kylo Ren's mouth as he opens a new tab on Tor and types out the website (from his memory, never bookmark) of his favorite pussy.

He logs in and changes his password, soon the familiar page begins to load. 

 _Rules: No spamming. Do not insist the cam hosts to do as you please. Do not announce other rooms or websites that would conflict with this room. Avoid any argumentative and/or rude posts related to the cam viewing. Do not attempt to post your e-mail address in the public chat._  
_To go to next room, press CTRL+/. To send a tip, press CTRL+S or type "/tip 25". To disable emoticons or adjust autocomplete settings, click the 'Gear' tab above._  
_Broadcaster **SEXY_SC4V3NG3R** running these apps: Tip Auto Reset Goal_  
_connection established_  
_room subject changed to "new collar ^^ #pussy #naked #strip #skinny #natural"_

Notice: Tip Menu:  
kiss(1) lick lips and fingers for 10s(10) put on cat ears(15) put on collar(18) meow(20) pm(25) say your name or a chosen short sentence(30) show panties(32) stand up and twirl(34) show feet for 10s(44) flash tits for 10s(55) 6 spanks(66) show doggy pose for 10s(77) flash ass for 10s(88) say allo to my pussy(99) flash pussy for 10s(111) 10 squats(199) stay topless for 5m(222) change underwear(333) take off gloves(444) full naked and dance for 5m(666) play pussy for 5m(888) private show(2000)

A gorgeous half-masked and fully-dressed girl is sitting in front of the screen, adjusting the camera while smiling. There is a one-minute countdown in the center of the screen.

Once the countdown is over, Kylo Ren smiles and moves his fingers over the keyboard. Soon comes a "ding", the kind of coins clashing sound that you hear when someone gives a tip on the camming site.

**B-O-S-S tipped 15 tokens.**

The girl puts on her black cat-ear headband and waves with one black gloved hand.

*Ding*

**B-O-S-S tipped 25 tokens.**

Kylo Ren sends a private message to the broadcaster.

[B-O-S-S: Hello kitty. Looks like I'm your first tonight again.]

[SEXY_SC4V3NG3R: [allo](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%27Allo_%27Allo!)! ur always so early x]

*Ding*

**B-O-S-S tipped 31 tokens.**

The girl makes a kissing sound with her red lips, and spells one letter after another, "B-O-S-S."

[B-O-S-S: Now smart girl, you know what you should be calling me.]

*Ding*

**B-O-S-S tipped 30 tokens.**

The girl winks and says in a very posh accent with a giggle, "Bossy Daddy!"

[B-O-S-S: Bad girl.]

*Ding*

**B-O-S-S tipped 66 tokens.**

The girl stands up, turns around to show off her mini-skirt, she twerks suggestively, lifts up the skirt to show her panty-clad butt, and spanks herself six times. The skin turns a lovely pink shade, she rubs at it while pouting towards the camera, and types.

[SEXY_SC4V3NG3R: am i a good girl now, daddy?]

*Ding*

**B-O-S-S tipped 20 tokens.**

The girl raises her fist close to her face to mimic a cat paw and meows sweetly with another wink, then sits down.

[B-O-S-S: How is our lovely pussy doing tonight?]

[SEXY_SC4V3NG3R: naughty as usual :wink]

[B-O-S-S: Good to know.]

[SEXY_SC4V3NG3R: wudnt u like to say allo? she misses u ]

*Ding*

**B-O-S-S tipped 100 tokens.**

[SEXY_SC4V3NG3R: luv u sooo much! :kiss]

The girl gives him a toothy grin, slowly stands up, twisting her waist and hips, and then reaches out to....

 

*Ding*

*Ding*

*Ding*

 

Kylo Ren is grinning from ear to ear as he tips more and more tokens.

It's been more than a month, and he still feels like they are in that honeymoon phrase. God, he loves to spoil her rotten.

 

* * *

 

**esp4_f3mm3f4t413.so**

Kira Rey is not naive.

She's very street smart. She has the experience and knowledge necessary to deal with the potential difficulties or dangers of life in an urban environment. She avoids trouble most of the time, but when push comes to shove, she is also not afraid to get in an honest-to-god fight. And she fights dirty, sometimes even with a staff.

Rey observes and learns carefully. She knows exactly who in her neighbourhood are hookers and pimps, who are addicts and dealers. She has seen the way they talk, the way they act, the way they trade and how sick they are. Sex and drug and alcohol are never a good combination. And she has been avoiding them for as long as she can and tries her best to be uplifting in life.

She loves inspirational movies.

Her first inspiration was "[Step Up](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Step_Up_\(film\))", she can still do some really sick pirouettes and fouettés, thanks to [Maz Kanata](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maz_Kanata), the bespectacled petite old lady had been impressed by Rey's mimicking outside her ballet studio window, so much so that she hired the girl as a cleaner, so that Rey would not feel guilty about practicing in the studio after everyone left.

Maz had once commented that her allegros and croisées were way better than any of her "paying" students, well, that was because Rey had been practicing harder than anyone else, since she began dancing much later than them. The reason she had picked up Russian and French so fast was because she wanted to fully understand her teacher's [ballet glossary. ](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glossary_of_ballet)It helped that she had uncanny motor coordination, extension and flexibility. But pointe shoes and tutus could be very expensive, not to mention private tutoring and choreography. Rey felt like she'd been living on Maz's charity during those dancing days. It was a real pity and misfortune that Maz had passed away before she could make up her mind to take part in [Young America Grand Prix](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Youth_America_Grand_Prix) in NYC, and by then she was over the age limit. Rey still stretches and practices whenever she can. A bun-head at heart, she still keeps her hair in buns to this day.

She's not a ballerina wannabe though. If Maz has taught her one thing, that is: all serious professionals are tough at the core.

And she wants to be a true serious professional at some field one day. She doesn't have a normal background growing up, but she is still a girl, and a girl can dream, big American dreams, like joining the Air Force and becoming an ace pilot or studying engineering and becoming a rocket scientist for the [NASA](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NASA) that sort of big dreams. But if she wants those dreams to come true, she needs to get higher education and get out of Queens, which she can never do.

Though waiting for her parents in Corona keeps her on the ground, she has always been fascinated by the sky. "[October Sky](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/October_Sky)" has made her cry so much. And she also has an unhealthy obsession with [Amelia Earhart](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amelia_Earhart). The old yellow pilot helmet with broken visor she scavenged from someone's dumpster, the one that is still kept in her shoebox studio, is the memento of that piloting dream. Because she could never afford an [Aviator Barbie](https://www.amazon.com/Barbie-Inspiring-Women-Amelia-Earhart/dp/B076Q6YJ2V/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1540445981&sr=8-1&keywords=aviator+barbie), she had even sewn a little female pilot toy herself to play with that helmet.

She has always been a handy girl, good at sewing and repairing, she has to, since most of her clothes are hand-me-downs from foster families and those households always need some mending. Little does she know that her sewing techniques will one day be used to make her own skanky costumes for camming, the ones that will be used to attract strangers and then stripped away on show for money.

She knows what it takes to be a successful camgirl. She has observed a lot of their live streaming. Selling you body is a sex trade, so she must be prepared.

Despite all her preparations, her first night camming was a mess. 

Okay, let's back up a little bit, the day before she officially began her cam show, she was so tired after late-night sewing that she fell asleep at work in Plutt's pawn shop. Unfortunately, she was supposed to be soldering small [capacitor](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capacitor)s with a scope. When she woke up with a start, three fingers and the back of her left hand had been burn by the [soldering iron](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soldering_iron). They were not mortal injuries, but it hurt like hell, and she could not exactly get insurance for work-related injuries. So she grit her teeth, washed the wounds with as much cold water as she could, applied some burn cream and wrapped her hand up with the bandage from Plutt's first aid kit, and stole some painkiller for good measure - she had to do so quietly.

Camming is all about fulfilling fantasies. Beauty is an illusion, but you have to show something pretty up front and close up. She has watched enough camgirls to know how important their hands and nails are. She envies those long beautiful French nails. She cannot afford any nail polish or manicure herself, so her best strategy was to keep them short and clean. But now with her hand burnt badly and hideously, she has to come up with an idea to cover the scars and hide the pain, because she knows men go to camming website to seek pleasure and relaxation, they don't want to pay some random half-masked chick for complaining injuries at work.

Suddenly, her eyes fix on the rest of Halloween haul she got, and they glint as she finds a pair of black gloves. She tries them on. They are [PU leather ones ](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bicast_leather)with a shiny surface and cotton linings, stretchy enough to cover the bandage, but not bulky enough to show. With her black mask and black gloves, maybe these can work together as her theme, like a [femme fatale](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Femme_fatale) or something, she reckons, sniggering.

Chaturbate gives new camming models a seven-day feature period, but it doesn't mean it will bring extra traffic if your avatar is unattractive. 

She begins her first cam show at 8 pm. The first thing she does is to double-check the geo-locks on her stream. God forbid that someone from Queens, or even worse, Corona, stumble upon her show by accident and recognize her half-masked face and accent.

But then she is dismayed to find out that the streaming and the audio input/output don't work that well, she is still figuring out some settings when she accidentally turns on the cam, gets an unflattering screenshot of her half-masked face and bumps her injured left hand on the table.

"[Bloody hell](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloody)!" she curses. Her hand is in more pain now.

Then she suddenly hears a "ding". 

She looks at the right side of the screen, the discussion board of the chat room. It says: 

**B-O-S-S tipped 10 tokens.**

A random stranger has just tipped her 10 tokens, for what? Then she sees the stranger has already sent a new message.

[B-O-S-S: Lovely voice.]

10 tokens for a curse? Hm? Maybe Rey has underestimated the value of her accent. She does a quick math. A token equals 5 cents, and the website takes a 40% cut, so that 10-token tip means 30 cents. It seems so little, but it's still money, more than her rater work! She must be grateful. So she sends a kiss with her fingers and gives him a toothy smile.

The discussion board shows another message immediately.

[B-O-S-S: Sweet smile. How many tokens do you charge to PM you?]

PM means private message, the stranger doesn't want his message to be seen by others. She looks at the user status of the chat room, there's no one else at the moment. Weird. She opens her mouth, but then remembers how many tokens he has paid for her curse, so she decides to use her voice abstemiously. 

She tries to type a number, but then stops her fingers, she cannot decide exactly how many tokens she should ask for. She is a new girl without any followers - no, she's got one follower now - she checks her status. She cannot compete with the popular ones who usually take no more than 20 tokens for PM. She has to set a reasonable rate, so as not to scare the stranger away. 

Slowly, she raises both hands and waves a little.

Another "ding" comes almost immediately.

**B-O-S-S tipped 20 tokens.**

Wait what? She meant 10 tokens! This guy must be desperate... Wait, is he going to send her a dick pic? After all, isn't that what PM is for? No wonder he doesn't want to show it to the chat room publicly.

Rey feels a little bit giddy. She basically did nothing and she's got 30 tokens already. It's a good thing that most of her face is covered by a mask. She doesn't want this stranger to see exactly how excited she feels. No matter how disgusting his dick may look like, at least she's getting paid to see it.

She switches to PM inbox, and sure enough, the stranger has already sent her a new message.

To her surprise, it's not a picture. Just a greeting, and a surprisingly un-cringing pickup line, considering her ID.

[B-O-S-S: Hello, new girl. Am I the first conquest on your [scavenger hunt](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scavenger_hunt)?]

How does he know she's new? Well, it's kind of obvious, isn't it? There is literally a green "NEW" sign on the bottom right corner of her avatar. She hasn't even finished the whole set-up and she's already making money and that's what really counts. She replies quickly.

[SEXY_SC4V3NG3R: yes u r my very 1st]

[B-O-S-S: What an honor.]

[B-O-S-S sends an emoji of two red cherries and another emoji of celebration poppers]

The meaning behind "[popping her cherry](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hymen)" turns Rey's face red. 

_Stop, the last thing you should do in a cam show is to act like the blushing virgin that you secretly are._

And before she can type a reply, there's another message already.

[B-O-S-S: May I have your name, please?]

Her ID (SEXY_SC4V3NG3R) is clearly written on her home page (aka her room), but she has watched enough cam shows to know that in order to feel some kind of connection, lonely viewers somehow always need to know a model's "name", you know, instead of "deviousmaiden" or "manicpixiebitch", what a mouthful.

Of course, she will absolutely not give him her real name. To be honest, "Rey" sounds like such a fake name that she doubts the man will even buy it. She nearly types "[Rae](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rae_\(given_name\))" but stops herself. Too close to her real one, and too American. 

What should she call herself? Damn, why hasn't she thought it through beforehand.

She looks down and see the pair of [daisy dukes](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daisy_Duke) she is wearing, the black denim shorts she was busy fixing last night. The ones that resulted in her burn today. Her left hand is still in pain. That's the reason she is wearing gloves. Staring at her gloved injured hand, she's at a loss.

_What have you done? You have reduced yourself to this._

Suddenly another "ding" pulls her out of her trance.

**B-O-S-S tipped 50 tokens.**

[B-O-S-S: I'm sorry. I should have known that a lady's name is very valuable.]

The stranger has mistaken her one-hand gesture for 50 tokens!? Okay, he pays the money, he's the boss, he should get a name from her.

Rey thinks quickly. Daisy dukes come from Daisy Duke, a sexy TV character. Daisy is a flower, flower is girly, Daisy is a sexy girly name and it sounds very English. Maybe this man will dig that. She hopes he will.

[SEXY_SC4V3NG3R: daisy]

[B-O-S-S: Lovely name. Dear Daisy.]

Rey can't help but smile at that.

[B-O-S-S: I love your dimples. You smile like a ray of sunshine.]

[B-O-S-S sends a sunflower emoji and a smiley.]

Rey stops smiling at once. The "[ray" floret](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asteraceae#Floral_heads) hits a little too close to home. She has to play it safe.

She checks the discussion board again. There are five users online in her room now. But no one is talking in the chat room. That's weird. Isn't Chaturbate supposed to put her on the front page to promote her or something? Maybe it's still too early. 

[B-O-S-S: How many tokens do you charge to take off your mask?]

Wow, that one hits home. The whole reason she is wearing her mask is to protect her identity. She does not intent to take it off at all, no matter the price.

Luckily, she has prepared for that one. And just in case her hand gesture gives the stranger any more ideas for a certain number, she quickly types.

[SEXY_SC4V3NG3R: sry, ill not take off my mask, personal reasons, its not for sale]

[B-O-S-S: I see. How many tokens do you charge to take off your tank top then?]

Rey snickers inside. Oh man. Considering how many tokens he has spent on her, this dude must be loaded. So she gambles.

[SEXY_SC4V3NG3R: 100 tks]

*Ding*

**B-O-S-S tipped 100 tokens.**

Yes! Rey secretly fist-pumps to celebrate, but then the pain prompts her to release her left palm.  _AUCH._

Okay, time to lose the tank top.

She grabs the hem of her black tank top and rolls it up. Then she sees the man's new message.

[B-O-S-S: Do it slowly, please.]

Okay, he wants a slow striptease, she will give him one.

She stands up and walks backward, making sure the camera is still focusing on her upper body, and then slowly, seductively takes off her tank top, paying attention that it will not drag along or mess with the ribbons of her mask. Then she throws the tank top on her chair in a fluid motion.

She is now wearing a strapless lacy white [balconette](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balconet), the cleanest and most presentable one she's got. Rey knows it's not very sexy, nor can it push up anything. She know her breasts are modest. She shrugs, hoping the man won't regret the money he has spent.

[B-O-S-S: Come closer, please.]

Slowly she walks closer to the camera, leans down, presses her hands on the table, making her cleavage look a little bit deeper.

Another "ding". She looks at the discussion board. Obviously her little striptease has finally attracted some more men. She's got more than 10 followers now. They are chatting about her gloves and her mask, and one of them just tipped her.

**oorah69 tipped 1 token.**

[oorah69: nice tiny boobies, how many tks to lose the bra, 20?]

20? Rey can't believe her eyes. The BOSS man has just spent 100 tokens to get her off her tank top, and this 1-token-tip guy thinks 20 is enough for her to show her nipples? 

Now that she thinks of it, she remembers that those popular girls usually take 50 tokens to flash their tits for 10 seconds or so.

God, the BOSS man has really spoiled her. Hopefully he hasn't ruined her for other men.

She shakes her head.

[oorah69: 30?]

Rey shakes her head again and touches her under boobs suggestively. She is aiming for at least 40. 

[oorah69: BITCH!]

[oorah69 has left the room.]

Rey curses inwardly for missing the chance, but then she shrugs. She knows free-loafers take up most of the viewership on such sites. At least he has paid 1 token. 

Rey sits down and begins toying with the edge of her bra, hoping to get the attention of other men.

Suddenly, a picture of an ugly uncut brown dick pops up on the discussion board, accompanied by a message.

[a-real-big-dick: yo bitch, ur tits r 2 small 4 titty fuck, ur mouth will haft do.]

Rey near gags at the vulgarness. 

[a-real-big-dick: good, open ur mouth wider for my big fat cock.]

Rey shuts her mouth at once, she is not here for men to objectify her.....

She stops her thought. She IS here for men to objectify her, for money. So she types quickly.

[SEXY_SC4V3NG3R: 20 tks for me to open my mouth wide.]

[a-real-big-dick: HO! u r not worth that much!]

Instead of leaving like that one-token-guy, this one continues to send degrading messages and hardcore pornographic gifs. What a real big dick! Rey hates him immediately.

What makes matters worse, some of the men decide to join in to humiliate her now. The discussion board is soon spammed by foul languages and filthy pictures, criticizing how small her tits are, how freckled her skin is, how pretentious her mask and gloves are, how ugly her face must be, and how they want to violate her orifices and cover her with their cum. Some new members send emojis to show their support for those derogatory comments too.

Rey stares at the screen, speechless, she bites her lip to hold back tears. She feels like she has been slapped in the face. No, it hurts more than the burning wounds. She has lived a hard life and faced a lot of difficulties, but never has she ever been verbally humiliated by random strangers like this! Has she done something terribly wrong? She doesn't know what to do.

_You are so naive! You think you can shake your tits and make money so easy? Look at how those pigs treat you like a cheap whore! You wanted to be a tough professional and now you are crying like a pathetic little girl! You are just a child in a ridiculous mask! You are nothing!_

Rey is in such emotional distress that she wants to quit already! She would rather do low-paid rating and labeling tasks or pick up more shifts at Plutt's! At least she won't have to face such criticism and humiliation!

Just before she reaches out to turn off the cam and stop streaming, she sees that there is an unread message in her PM inbox. She clicks it open and is nearly in a swoon.

[B-O-S-S: Dear Daisy. Don't get upset. You can ban them. You own the room.]

Rey smiles through tears and executives her power as the cam host to ban all those abusive pigs. Then she lets out a sign of relief. The chat room is refreshed and clear now. In fact, there's only one user left.

Then comes another "ding".

**B-O-S-S tipped 100 tokens.**

[B-O-S-S: Good job. You did the right thing. It must have been really hard on you. You deserve better.]

[SEXY_SC4V3NG3R: tkx! ur the best!]

[B-O-S-S: What's your goal tokens for tonight?]

Most camming models on this website set a certain goal for a night. Once they reach the goal, usually after a big tip for a private show, they will conclude business for the night.

Rey tilts her head. She had originally set her nightly goal at 1,000 tokens for the first week. It's a humble goal, nowhere near those top models. She had thought that she could work with a four-digit number. But Rey can already feel how exhausting it is just sitting there and dealing with rude people, not to mention doing any sexual acts with multiple people. The thought itself makes her sick.

It seems she has overestimated her tolerance, or underestimated the cruelty of this camming industry. Observing and actually doing it are totally different. Her perspective has been totally changed by that real big dick. A game-changer.

She really is too naive. And her so-called preparations look like a child's play now. She's in the adult business, for fuck's sake.

And judging from the real situation at hand, she doubts she will get a better chance. At least this stranger is generous and polite. So she takes a chance again. She hopes the odds are in her favor once more. 

[SEXY_SC4V3NG3R: 1k]

She does another quick math, she has already receive 281 tokens, so the man will have to pay another 719, which is a big number.

It takes a while, long enough for Rey to get worry that the man has given up. Maybe that's really too much.

But then comes the fateful "ding" that makes Rey cover her mouth.

**B-O-S-S tipped 2,000 tokens.**

[B-O-S-S: Let's have a private show.]

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone, here's Саша again. 
> 
> Look, our Benny boy is burning money like a sugar daddy for the sweetheart he has a crush on. Your mama would be so proud :)
> 
> Why did Ben tip 2k instead of 1k? The idea came from the title of Lando's miniseries "[Double or Nothing](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Star_Wars:_Lando:_Double_or_Nothing)". To underpromise and overdeliver is a pretty good way to impress a girl. Unca Wanwo would be so proud of his little starfighter, too :)
> 
> Rey is obviously a virgin, so when she decides to be a camgirl, her naive idea is to show dancing, striptease, flashing and dirty talks, and maybe masturbation. As you can see from her tipping list, there's nothing too hardcore. She's got an adorable "pretty pussy baby girl" persona there after camming for a month.
> 
> I imitate the way Rey and Kylo type messages in DL, Rey is full of short hands and small letters while Kylo always uses proper spellings and full sentences. Rey pretends to be British, so her way of greeting ('allo) and cursing (bloody hell) is very specific.
> 
> In Ch3 of DL, Rey has an obvious aversion to electronics work, especially fine works that involve a soldering iron, so a serious burn at work might be a plausible cause. The way Rey treats her burn wounds is the best possible way to avoid scarring I can find in her situation, if you are a medical pro and has a better way, please tell me.
> 
> Eric Harris was the teen gunman in Columbine High School massacre. This mass murderer was very good at shooting games Doom and Doom II, and he also wanted to be a Marine. I deliberately write the gaming aspect of Ben in a way that is very similar to that of his. The [Harris levels](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doom_\(1993_video_game\)#Controversies) have caused great controversies about gaming and school shootings.
> 
> The Evil Overlord and pussy-stroking is a running joke about Russian villains, in case you haven't seen any Bond movies. I like to insert some Russian jokes in my stories.
> 
> The dancing aspect of Rey will be featured here again, it's part of [the Dark Pseudo-Incest Ballet AU](https://archiveofourown.org/works/17012973/chapters/39996243) that I've written. Most ballet dancers begin very young, while Rey in this story began too late, 19 is the age limit of YAGP, and normally it takes 5-10 years of professional training to get there. The irony here is, despite a near 10-year age gap, Ben was too young to join the military, while Rey was too old to take part in YAGP or audition for SAB and then go to NYCB. She would have been able to dance in New York City while living with the Solo twins in [Not Bad At All](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14351400), my Breylo AU.
> 
> B-O-S-S stands for Benjamin Organa Skywalker Solo. He is kinda showing her his full name right from the start. BOSS is an easter egg in most of my stories, such as [Sleepy Beauty](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16168178), [Beauty and the Beast](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16168337), [Two of a Kind](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16102937) and [Two Sittings for One](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16129025).
> 
> I think it's quite obvious why Rey chose the name [Daisy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daisy_Ridley) and why Ben wanted to join the [Marines](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam_Driver#Military_service_and_education).
> 
> How many of you have thought "a real big dick" meant Ben when it first appeared at the end of chapter one? He's a real game-changer, isn't he? Just for disclosure, our Big Ben is really big in that department too :)
> 
> Remember that rude 1-token-guy? [Oorah](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oorah_\(Marines\)) is a battle cry common in the United States Marine Corps since the mid-20th century. Why do I need to point this out? Because just like the case of a-real-big-dick, it would be further explored in future chapters. I tend to hide a lot of easter eggs in my story, and I can't wait to tell you more.
> 
> Sadly, cyberbullying and degrading languages are common on social media. 
> 
> Writing this story is so much fun. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.


	3. Pro Bono|Bona Fide

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone, here's Саша again. I hope this chapter will bring you a lot more insight and joy.
> 
> Kylo Ren is a solo man.  
> Kira Rey is a smart girl.
> 
> Oh and Happy Birthday to Adam Driver, who is the light of my life and I hope you will never read my rapey series.

**esp5_pr0_b0n0.flv**

Kylo Ren is a solo man.

Of course, his birth certificate literally states his surname is Solo, and he lives a very busy solo life, which basically means he's very lonely when he is not working or working out.

Go to the gym every day, meditate for an hour every day, get up before 6 every day - those are the common life-changing advice given by successful startup entrepreneurs, and thousands of normal people enthusiastically follow the exact same process.

And those folks continue to lead a normal life. 

Success also requires luck, fortuitous timing, useful connections, and strong domain knowledge.

They don't really tell you these things though, because you can't acquire or learn any of those things by liking their tweets.

And sometimes, it even has something to do with your gender. And this is something with a touch of politically incorrectness.

Being a male certainly has its perks in the West-Coast-California-Tech-circle.

If you are a woman, even if you have been worked as Kylo Ren's right hand at the First Order for twenty years, there are meetings you would never be invited to. Look at Phasma. If she were a man she would be running this company. Yet she hasn’t gotten a promotion in six years. 

Kylo Ren is not a people person, he may not be evil, and he is not always lucky, but he sure has useful connections and strong domain knowledge. Since he specializes in AI machine learning, he also never stops learning himself, you know, just in case.

Watching porn or trolling the internet is just something he occasionally indulges in. 

A genius like him sometimes spends his celibate non-coding-related spare time doing something much more intellectually-stimulating, such as fast-[MOOC](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massive_open_online_course)ing on [Coursera](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coursera), [Udacity](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Udacity), and [edX](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EdX).

A long-time advanced MOOCer, he usually just skims through the syllabus and slides before watching the videos at up to double speed. This approach allows him to cover all the material more efficiently, which can be useful if time is in short supply. He's been so used to this kind of learning that even some MOOCs on algorithms, math, or physics are finished this way, while he is running or spinning with wireless earpieces on.

His focus is always on quick wins and applications, and from a certain point of view, that makes him a very successful man.

Where trusting in Uncle Luke has fucked him over, trusting in Snoke has paid dividends. He is very rich, probably has more money than he knows what to do with it - actually, he knows how to spend more wisely now, thanks to some MOOCs on financing - but he is not a happy man.

He has developed a dedicated mindfulness practice as part of a long-ago anger management course mandated by a compliance board at First Order following an unfortunate incident. While he hasn't found it has any effect on his temper, when he isn't over his head in a blinding rage it does help him reflect on his motivations a bit, and such reflection seems more than usually warranted. 

He is no longer constantly angry, but he is still always tense and lonely. Not that he is desperately looking for happiness, which he knows it's not that easy, or even there for him, for that matter. 

He has browsed all the subreddits on r/Tinder mostly for the screencaps of terrible and hilarious pick-up lines. However, after the first and only Tinder hookup that he chickened out of, he deleted the app and doesn't use it anymore, even when he really wants to get laid, he figures it is not worth the emotional investment. 

When he was a teenager, he never pictured himself living past 25, he didn’t see himself living in some tony building in San Francisco creating machines of war. He figured he’d probably end it all at some point, when the going got tough enough that it wasn’t worth getting out of bed anymore. 

He is over 30 years old now, he knows he has some serious mental problem and the situation is really not looking good, what with the DoD contract deadline pressing in and Snoke's constant criticism, and that is the reason he has resorted to another self-help course that he does not entirely believe in.

It is a new MOOC called ["The Science of Well-Being"](https://www.coursera.org/learn/the-science-of-well-being/home/welcome) from Yale University.

Kylo Ren first reads the whole syllabus to see what it can offer during a lunch break.

He reads about misconceptions about happiness, why people expections are so bad, how to overcome biases, stuff that really makes people happy and putting strategies into practice. He looks up the references and many of the books the course mentions seem legit, at least according to their Amazon reviews.

He clicks on "Starts a new journey", a one-minute video. Turns out, the professor of the course looks even more depressed than him, a slightly overweight middle-aged woman with long unwashed curly hair, the barest amount of makeup and chipped manicure, sitting on her ugly flowery sofa at home, facing about 25 students from Yale and other universities.

Kylo looks at the fresh faces of those undergraduates, and feels like he is ancient.

The only savory thing about her teaching is probably her salt and pepper hair, the way she talks is dry and bland.

The second introduction video, "Become Happier by Learning & Applying Psychological Science", a four-minute video, is even drier than the first one, the slides are simple and to the point, but the whole presentation is "off". 

Kylo is not a teacher, but he has done and seen his fair share of presentations - you have to if you are working in an IT company, especially if you are rising up the manageria ladder - and he knows how to see through bullshit riddled with funny memes and non-sense word combinations.

When he gives his quarterly Cyber Security presentation at the First Order, which is an almost masochistic exercise, going over his own family’s history (their Rebellion in the Cold War era and now the Resistance that is not so subtly working against the FO) so impersonally, Kylo tries to come across like a Very Important But Also Normal and Down-to-earth Executive. This is never a very natural role for him to play. But even he can adopt a visionary thought leader way of speech after having watched enough [TED Talks](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TED_\(conference\)). He calls them inspirational porn for the common.

He has thought the teacher should at least be cheerful or more uplifting. Why would someone who doesn't even make an effort to put on a nice smile teach a course about happiness is beyond him. 

He fast-forwards to the third video, "Why this Course Exists", and this is what he finds out.

_".... But the third reason is actually the most personal one of why I wanted to teach this, which is that it's not just Yale students that need these insights, I actually need these insights too. So I'm kind of like below average on my own happiness. So you might have the thought that like the professor teaching this course is like this smiley, happy, and I go through life around all these Yale students who are sad, and I'm like 'I'm going to make you guys as happy as I am.' But in fact that is not true, if anything it's like I'm sad."_

And then the teacher cracks a sarcastic smile, surprisingly, it tilts up the corner of Kylo's mouth.

Oh great, so she IS depressed. But at least the no-nonsense teacher is not trying to bullshit people with empty words and fake promises, Kylo will give her that.

But still, Kylo almost quits after the introduction week. It is mandated for all the students to take a PERMA™️ (an acronym for Positive emotion, Engagement, Relationships, Meaning, and Accomplishment— the basic dimensions of psychological flourishing). The questionnaire has 23 questions and once Kylo submits his responses, he will receive scores ranging from 0-10 for each pillar along with scores for overall well-being, health, and negative emotions.

And these are his PERMA results:

  * Positive emotions = 0.67 
  * Engagement = 2.67 
  * Relationships = 1 
  * Meaning = 0.67 
  * Accomplishment = 2
  * Health = 5.67 
  * Negative emotions = 9.33 
  * Loneliness = 10 
  * Overall Well-Being = 1.31



He has already known he is lonely and depressed as hell, and this is just a quantitative reminder that he is fucked, mentally and physically, not even his intense workout can make up for his depressing mindset and shitty overall well-being.

He looks up reviews of local therapists who takes his insurance, and then closes the tab. 

He goes back to the MOOC, downloads the Rewirement Workbook PDF, and begins to work his way through the course.

_WEEK ONE: USE YOUR SIGNATURE STRENGTHS_

_Go back to the course under “Your Rewirements for this Week” for resources on how to determine your signature strengths and a list of ideas on how to use them. Once you have discovered your top strengths, try to use them in new ways every day for a week._

He goes to the [VIA Website](http://bit.ly/SWBCharacterStrengths), registers and then frowns as he sees this:

_Please choose one option in response to each statement. All of the questions reflect statements that many people would find desirable, but we want you to answer only in terms of whether the statement describes what you are like. Please be honest and accurate! We cannot rank your strengths until you answer all of the 120 questions._

Basically, he has to answer 120 questions with options like: Very Much Like Me / Like Me / Neutral / Unlike Me / Very Much Unlike Me

He begins to check the first page.

  * Being able to come up with new and different ideas is one of my strong points. - Very Much Like Me
  * I have taken frequent stands in the face of strong opposition. - ~~Like Me Neutral~~ Unlike Me (He often has to take Snoke's yelling like a bitch.)
  * I never quit a task before it is done. - ~~Like Me~~ Neutral (He doesn't even know he will finish the whole course.)
  * I always keep my promises. - Neutral
  * I have no trouble eating healthy foods. -  ~~Like Me~~ Neutral (On weekends, he mostly lived on protein drinks; on weekdays he has three square meals for free at the office.)
  * I always look on the bright side. - Very Much Unlike Me
  * I am a spiritual person. - Very Much Unlike Me
  * I know how to handle myself in different social situations. - Very Much Unlike Me
  * I always finish what I start. - ~~Like Me~~ Neutral (Oh, he doesn't have father issues. Grandfather issues, maybe.)



As the questions go on and on, many of them begin to feel repetitive, to be honest. And the more he ticks on "neutral" and "unlike me" about the spiritual, teamwork and friend stuff, the more he feels like a lonely loser.

It takes him about 15 minutes to finish all the questions, and unsurprisingly, when he gets the results, his top signature strengths are:

  1. Love of learning
  2. Perspective
  3. Creativity
  4. Judgment



The assignment for the first week is to "use your signature strengths", what should he do?

Since he has a passion for learning, he would like to master new skills, related to the strength of curiosity but goes beyond it to describe the tendency to add systematically to what one knows, a very typical programmer's way of thinking, in short, he will continue this MOOC course.

His perspective makes him aware of the "ReWi" app they have developed for the course is seriously lacking, the app quits unexpectedly whenever people try to upload a picture to record their progress.

His creativity, or rather his annoyance at this defected app, makes Kylo help fix the bugs for the iPhone version, and then for the Android users even if he is not one himself.

And his judgment helps him think things through and examine them from all sides instead of jumping to conclusions and weigh all evidence fairly. Maybe this will actually help improve his well-being.

Some of his "classmates" show their appreciation in the class discussion board, and it actually makes him feel good about himself for once, so much so that he has a good night of sleep.

He never gets a compliment he can just enjoy at First Order. Snoke has this amazing way of paying a compliment so it makes you feel really bad about yourself and it costs Kylo many sleepless nights. He doesn't skip into the office every day handing out lollipops. They think Positive feedback is for liberal arts majors and little girls. 

But since he is enjoying the MOOC like a dirty little secret, so he decides he might as well go on to the next week.

The second week is all about "Savoring & Gratitude".

 _SAVORING:_  
_Savoring is the act of stepping outside of an experience to review and appreciate it. Savoring intensifies and lengthens the positive emotions that come with doing something you love. This week, practice the art of savoring by picking one experience to truly savor each day. It could be a nice shower, a delicious meal, a great walk outside, or any experience that you really enjoy. When you take part in this savored experience, be sure to practice some common techniques that enhance savoring. These techniques include: sharing the experience with another person, thinking about how lucky you are to enjoy such an amazing moment, keeping a souvenir or photo of that activity, and making sure you stay in the present moment the entire time._

 _DAILY GRATITUDE JOURNAL:_  
_Gratitude is a positive emotional state in which one recognizes and appreciates what one has received in life. Research shows that taking time to experience gratitude can make you happier and even healthier. For the next seven days, take 5-10 minutes each night to write down five things for which you are grateful. They can be little things or big things. But you really have to focus on them and actually write them down. You can just write a word or short phrase, but as you write these things down, take a moment to be mindful of the things you’re writing about (e.g., imagine the person or thing you’re writing about, etc.). This exercise should take at least five minutes. Do this each night for the whole week._

In short, he just needs to appreciate something small per day for a week, it's very easy too.

The first day, he writes down local Chinese takeout, [Dijon mustard](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dijon_mustard), [Arrogant Bastard](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arrogant_Bastard) ale, [Rage Against the Machine](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rage_Against_the_Machine) and his [Darth Vader look-alike Vacuum machine.](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14351400) He posts these things on the "ReWi" app anonymously to record and share them with no one in particular.

He tries for a week, it actually feels nice.

The third week is about "Kindness & Social Connection".

_RANDOM ACTS OF KINDNESS:_

_Research shows that happy people are motivated to do kind things for others. Over the next seven days, try to perform seven acts of kindness beyond what you normally do. You can do one extra act of kindness per day, or you can do a few acts of kindness in a single day. These do not have to be over-the-top or time-intensive acts, but they should be something that really helps or impacts another person. For example, help your colleague with something, give a few dollars or some time to a cause you believe in, say something kind to a stranger, write a thank you note, give blood, and so on. At the end of each day, list your random act of kindness. Just make sure you've finished seven total new acts of kindness by the end of the week._

_SOCIAL CONNECTION:_

_Research shows that happy people spend more time with others and have a richer set of social connections than unhappy people. Studies even show that the simple act of talking to a stranger on the street can boost our mood more than we expect. This week, you will try to focus on making one new social connection per day. It can be a small 5-minute act like sparking a conversation with someone on public transportation, asking a coworker about his/her day, or even chatting to the barista at a coffee shop. At least once this week, take a whole hour to connect with someone you care about. The key is that you must take the time needed to genuinely connect with another person. At the end of the day, list the social connection you made and notice how you feel when you jot it down._

Basically, it asks him to do at least one random act of kindness a day and build connections with strangers for seven days.

This is a tricky one, since he is a known jerk-face and doing any acts of kindness at First Order may even cause a riot, he has an asshole reputation to uphold, for fuck's sake, not to mention he is socially awkward. But the assignment does not specify he should do those things in real life, so he takes it to his favorite social media site, Reddit.

[AskReddit](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/) is obviously the best place to randomly help solve strangers' problems and even talk to them in the comment sections.

He browses those subreddits casually, some of the questions have already been answered, and he doesn't want to take part in any heated discussions about politics and environment.

Then one title catches his eyes.

_How to get WIFI for an old DCI laptop?_

DCI stands for Democratic Computing Initiative, a charity project started by his father Han Solo, who built some low-cost laptops and handed them to poor kids at the Boys and Girls Club in New York, 14 years ago.

Back when he still went by Ben (or Benny Beanstalk as his mother'd liked to call him).

Back when dial-up Internet access was prevalent.

Back when he hadn't cut ties with his family. 

Back when he and his father's relationship was still relatively tolerable.

Back when Han spent a lot of time teaching Ben how to build electronics instead of how to chat up girls.

Back when Ben took part in the DCI's R&D department for those laptops when he was not busy building [neural networks](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_neural_network) under the tutelage of his uncle.

God. It feels like it was a lifetime ago.

And suddenly he is Benjamin Organa Skywalker Solo again.

DCI laptops are mostly antiquity and hardcore collector's items now. It is sort of famous in certain small circles because it can still fly today and it can take tremendous abuse. Some people even use it as a blunt weapon - considering it had been designed to gift to children in the slum. Some of them even joke it is bullet-proof.

It isn't bullet-proof, of course. They were not actual weapons and it was too expensive to obtain certain materials from [Nokia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia)'s suppliers at that time. There is a reason those laptops are called "low-cost".

The memory brings a smile back to Ben's face as he clicks on it to see how the Redditor u/peanutbuns describes his problem as he wonders: 

Why would someone want to get WIFI for a laptop that had been designed before the prevalence of WIFI? But nerds are nerds and the geeky ones are known to have done weirder stuff, yeah, such as world domination via autonomous weapons.

Turns out, the length u/peanutbuns would go to fix that old laptop is almost uncanny. The Redditor has swapped in a new hard drive, new RAM, and even replace the touchpad, and now the user is finding it almost impossible to get WIFI for it and that's why he made this post. 

Ben thinks u/peanutbuns is a "he" because the ID (not exactly food for thought, huh?) and everything else points to a very stereotype dude way of thinking, and Ben reckons he must be some sort of mechanic technician or antique computer enthusiast. This guy may not be an expert, but he is at least a true appreciator of Ben and his father's invention.

Though he is more into the coding side of technology these days, he still has a trick up his sleeve when it comes to mechanical improvement of his own design. He obviously doesn't need to tell people about that part of him though, you know, privacy and everything. The fact that u/renulator1138 is Ben Solo in another life is not public knowledge, and it cannot appear on Kylo Ren's Wikipedia or LinkedIn page.

Nonetheless, Ben appreciates u/peanutbuns's efforts, so he types an answer in the comment section, suggesting him to replace that custom low-power motherboard. He is not sure whether the user will see his answer and successfully get WIFI after that, but at least he has offered a solution to his dilemma, something only someone with the surname Solo may be able to solve. 

Just like that, Ben has done the random act of kindness of the day, mission accomplished!

And then, since he is a little curious, he clicks on u/peanutbuns's ID to see his profile.

The Redditor has a default Reddit avatar, has less than 100 karmas, has joined the site for five years, that question is one of his few posts. Not an active user, a potential lurker then.

Ben makes a quick browse of the posts that u/peanutbuns has made over the years. Turns out all he has asked about are questions about changing hard drives and other electronics spare parts for devices such as handsets, microphones and cameras, which confirms Ben's previous prediction, a mechanic or a hobbyist, and the posts he made can only be described as "rough handling" with lots of shorthands and spelling mistakes.

Ben doubts the dude has got much professional training or proper education. For all he knows, u/peanutbuns might be a 14-year-old high school student or a 60-year-old redneck retiree tinkering radio spare parts in their dim basement.

And then, just because Ben still has some time to kill, he clicks on what kind of comments u/peanutbuns has made, in case he is secretly a racist and/or misogynist troll. You can never be too sure about guys that have a thing with renovating old technologies.

The redditor frequents [r/NeverTellMetheOdds](https://www.reddit.com/r/nevertellmetheodds/) for those nearly impossible feats of achievement, those with great degree of difficulty or incredible odds, Ben shudders as it sounds like something his old man would say. What are the odds of seeing someone (a possible Han Solo OG fanboy?!) asking question about the laptop you and your father designed 14 years ago on a social media site and you happen to stumble upon it when you are in a very gracious mood?

Also, his latest comment is in [r/Unixporn](https://www.reddit.com/r/unixporn/). Contrary to what the name suggests, r/Unixporn is NOT about porn, but a place to appreciate *NIX desktops, themes and nifty configurations, or anything that will make ricers happy, if you don't understand half of the above sentence, you are not geeky enough to enjoy it. Ben shrugs.

The logical part of Ben's mind quickly finds out that u/peanutbuns has an obvious uptick on his comment activities in the past month, especially in a subreddit called [r/CamgirlProblems](https://www.reddit.com/r/CamGirlProblems/), a place for adult webcam models to talk about their problems and promote themselves by posting sexy photos, a subreddit that obviously and easily attracts a lot of horny guys. 

Such a typical dude thing to do, Ben shrugs as he clicks on one of the links that looks somewhat enticing.

And that opens a new door for Benjamin Organa Skywalker Solo (B-O-S-S), who is no longer that solo after the fateful yet random act of kindness.

 

**esp6_b0n4_f1d3.flv**

Kira Rey is a smart girl.

She has practically raised herself to adulthood and she believes she can handle most difficult situations.

She knows there are things in life that just won't go the way you think, no matter how hard you try, but there are always ways to work around it, if you really want to.

To get around her money problem, she picks up more shifts at the pawn shop, does more rating and labelling contractor tasks for IT companies, and when those still don't work out, she eventually decides to get another part-time job.

With her ever more desperate financial issue, Rey is urgently seeking an effective method to sustain her life in her studio instead of in the street, in Corona, Queens. While geography, industry, and technology are important considerations, gender is an imperative factor that cannot be ignored.

Because her body - her tits in particular - may well be her most valuable assets for someone who doesn't have a high school diploma, good luck or useful connections, and her street smarts can only go so far.

Talent and beauty is critical to staying competitive, but despite the growing number of webcam models in the camming business, the female talent pool continues to remain underutilized. And once you find a niche market (there are certain kinks that are yet to be explored), however small that is, you may hit the jackpot and rise to the top. Because there are always horny and creepy guys looking for new girls to fulfill their kinky fantasies.

Sure, there are male models (aka the camboys), especially for the gay and bi demographics, but female models probably take away more than 80% of the industry's revenues, remember there are also large amount of lesbians out there, and female are both big consumers and investors. There is a reason they are commonly called "cam girls" or "cam whores".

Because let's face it, it is the oldest profession in human history: prostitution.

And she intends to fully capitalize on this ironic gender dividend.

But turns out she is not exactly as smart as she thinks, more like a smart-ass, and her bad luck flares up again like an old army injury - no, worse, there are actual new burn injuries on her left hand due to an unfortunate accident at work. She has to cover her hands with gloves.

Her so-called camming career is almost shattered not long after she starts it and she suffers from a textbook case of cyberbullying.

She hates being in a damsel in distress situation and she doesn't want to be rescued by a prince charming. 

She is not a six-year-old girl, she knows prince and princesses are things of Disney movies, not her real life, not even [Lifetime](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lifetime_\(TV_network\)) or [Hallmark](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hallmark_Movies_%26_Mysteries).

Then B-O-S-S, her first client, a seemingly nice guy, helps her by giving her some much-needed spamming advice, and she kicks those rude pigs out of her room.

And it feels nice to be helped. 

But after B-O-S-S has tipped her 2000 tokens and asks for a private show, something hits her hard.

B-O-S-S does help her, but he doesn't save her. He is not a prince charming or a knight in shiny armor. Far from it.

He pays her, for her service, a flirt, a strip tease, and then what?

Rey suddenly remembers a joke she heard from somewhere: prostitution is the only job where you can charge more for having no prior experience.

And right now, she is at a complete loss. Because she does not know what to do and she cannot tell him that she is a virgin.

To have a private show with a client on the site, she will have to take her client to her private room, all she needs to do is to click a few buttons, that's the easiest part.

Once they are in the private room, her camera feed will be reserved only for the client. No one in her public chat - the open domain - will see her private performance.

There is a saying in this business: what happens in the private room stays in the private room.

And there things can go many ways.

Most clients will then turn on their cameras to have a private live-stream session with the cam model, to put it simply, they are going to see each other, talk to each other, interact with each other.

And then, most likely, they are going to engage in cybersex.

That is the part Rey hasn't thought through yet. She has thought maybe she can earn enough tokens by showing herself in the public chat. She never thought she would be offered a private show request on the first night.

She doesn't have a very clear idea about how to proceed from this part, with a complete stranger.

Despite all her research, she has never actually paid another cam model to do a private show for her. It is something out of her budget limit.

What if he is a creep?

If he is just horny and needs to rub one out, he can always watch porn online. There are PornHub and RedTube and thousands of sites to buy or download legal or illegal explicit contents.

Or if he is too cheap, he can always watches the public camming like other free-loaders.

Consider how mellow the way he talks and how generous he tips, he is obviously familiar with camming sites and their rules and settings (at least more so than Rey) and has a lot of money to burn, and that makes him a seasoned john of sorts?

Men who spend a lot of time and money on camming sites (or hookers) are usually not the decent boyfriend/husband material, that much she knows. 

If he is rich and handsome, he doesn't even need to go to such sites or pay for sex since women (or men, Rey doesn't really judge that much) will no doubt rush to throw themselves into his arms.

So, the very possible reasons that he cannot get a partner in real life is that he is either too shy, too old, too fat, too ugly, or kinky as hell.

All those possibilities sound terrible to Rey.

However genteel he may seem, you can never judge a book by its cover.

The fact that he is called B-O-S-S with all capital letters means there is an unusually high possibility that the man is into the Dom/Sub scene and that opens a new world to various kinks and fetishes.

Rey is not naive, she has searched her fair share of porn and has read enough hentai erotica, and she knows about how perverted some people can be.

Some people are into role-plays, not the garden-variety nurse/patient or teacher/student, but incestuous pairing, hardcore [furries](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Furry_fandom) or rapist/victim.

Some guys [get off by molesting people on public transportation among the crowds, and there is even a whole genre of porn called Chikan](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16627502/chapters/38980034) for that one.

Even though Chaturbate has an explicit ban against public demonstration of urination, excrement or fisting (Rey shudders when she thinks about the last two, watersports she can sort of accept), there is no guarantee that a client will not ask for something like that in a private show.

What is his expectation then?

Shit, she should have set her hard limits before she gave him the goal tokens. They have not even talked about how long a private show would last!

And the scariest part is, the man has doubled her goal, paying her 2k instead of 1k, so she really can not say no or up the game.

She has a looming private show, with no clear direction or limit to go. 

There are things that she's just not ready to do.

Just then, she sees a PM from B-O-S-S.

[B-O-S-S: Dear Daisy, are you ready?]

No, she is definitely not ready.

But he is a paying client. She has been debating for too long. She shouldn't let him wait any longer.

Because in the practical part of her mind, she still thinks, if she gives him a good performance, maybe he will be a repeat client. Because he is generous and kind, no matter how unattractive he is or disgusting his taste may be. And money is money. She needs money.

Reluctantly, she invites B-O-S-S to her private room.

The setting is similar to that of her public chat, but there are some more options, face-to-face cam being the most obvious one.

Rey looks at the part of the screen that belongs to the client, dreading the inevitable.

What does he look like?

What will he ask her to do?

But it remains black.

And soundless.

After a little while, Rey begins to suspect that something is wrong with her setting. Should she turn on something? Which button should she click?

Just as she fumbles with the mouse - her gloves doesn't work on touchpad - the chat on the right side begins.

[B-O-S-S: If you don't mind, I'd like to keep my camera and microphone off for this private show.]

Rey is so relieved that she nearly bursts into tears. It will be a one side private show, something similar to her public chat, she can totally accept that.

[SEXY_SC4V3NG3R: sure!]

She decides against typing "ur wish is my command" since she really doesn't know what he wants and she can't promise something she can't deliver.

[B-O-S-S: Let's pick up where we were interrupted then. Shall we continue?]

So he wants the strip tease to continue, that she can do.

Rey nods and makes sure the camera focus on her upper body, as she begins to sensuously touch her chin and her neck with her gloved hands, and then moves them down to her collar bones, to her bra-clad breasts and flat stomach, up and down, back and forth....

And then Rey moves further away from the computer, so as to make sure her hips and legs are on the camera.

She undoes the top button of the daisy dukes and then unzips it in a really unhurried motion, and just for the theatrics, she turns around and shakes her hips as she lets the shorts fall to the ground, showing her white panties - a really plain lacy pair, but the most decent ones that she has and they match her bra. She hopes the man will think they are a cute match.

Then slowly, she turns around to face the camera, and caresses herself from her stomach to her thighs, to her crotch, just barely, but suggestively. She has repeated those motions in front of the mirror for many times now. She even licks her lips for good measure.

She looks at the camera and waits for his next command, forcing herself not to shiver at the idea of taking off her bra or panties next. And hopefully the man will be satisfied with that.

But what if he asks her to touch her privates.... to masturbate in front of him?

For all she knows, the man may have been furiously jerking off behind the other screen.

[B-O-S-S: Beautiful. You are as elegant as a dancer.]

Rey widens her eyes. Another comment that hits home, her sore point, her dream that can never come true.

[SEXY_SC4V3NG3R: thx]

[B-O-S-S: Could you dance little more, please?]

[SEXY_SC4V3NG3R: of course]

She can more than dance a little. 

She looks around her surrounding. Most cam girls choose to do camming in bed since that's obviously where the most explicit activities will take place.

But Rey only has an old fold-up bed and mismatched bedsheets that she deems too ugly to be on the camera, so she has moved them away, puts her computer on the only desk she has, and opts for the plain curtain and wooden floor as the background. Nothing to show her actual personal space or preferences.

That also means the space is really small, it's not big enough for any big jumps or big turns, and she is barefoot, the best she can do are demi-pointe moves, that limits her mobility greatly.

But she guesses the guy won't criticize her technique even if she makes some small mistakes.

She doesn't have a portable [barre](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barre_\(ballet\)), but the back of her chair should make do. She picks up the daisy dukes and puts them away.

She does a little simple balancé to warm up her feet and joints and test her turnout - fondu, relevé, fondu _-_  executed in three counts. She's still got it.

And then she does several sets of battement fondu développé with some improvised port de bras. They are simple and neat, and she knows how the moves show off her long lean arms and legs.

[B-O-S-S: Bravo! You are a ballerina?]

She is not. She had only shortly danced as an apprentice in Maz's studio. Ballerina is a principal female ballet dancer of a dancing company while she is far from a professional dancer, not even a part of the corps de ballet. But many people make that mistake, and she doesn't want to correct him and annoy him.

A guy's ego is not something you should intentionally bruise on a camming site. It's bad for business. So she subtly nods.

[B-O-S-S: Great! Could you show me your dance shoes, please? [Pointe shoes](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pointe_shoe), aren't they?]

She nods. At least he knows what those things are called.

She does still keep some old pointe shoes, toe pads, lambswool and tape stored away in a box under her bed. They are one of the many things gifted by Maz, her old ballet instructor. 

Rey brings the shoe box to the desk, and shows the camera her old shoes one by one, turn them over and over to demonstrate the box, the sole and the binding. 

Though worn out around the edge, the thing about pointe pointe is, a ballet dancer will never dance right after putting on brand new pointe shoes.

The shoes have to be broken in, including deforming them with hands or against hard surfaces, striking them on hard surfaces, and moistening or heating the boxes to soften the glues, but these methods may shorten a pointe shoe's usable lifetime.

Another reason she cannot continue ballet, because pointe shoes are expandable, and they can be very expensive.

Then she looks up and sees he has sent another request.

[B-O-S-S: Could you show me how to put your shoes on, please?]

That she can do. And she begins to suspect the man has a thing with shoes or feet. Very common fetish.

So she sits down on the chair, flexes her toes, arches and ankles on the desk deliberately, making sure they are all on camera.

She is actually glad that she hasn't danced for a while, since all her toenails have finally fully regrown and now at least her feet looks normal, well, with unusually high arches and flexibility, of course. And she has mostly healed from her dancer's heel - a tightening of the instep tendon that causes discomfort in the instep and heel.

Ballet is all beautiful on the outside, but ugly on the inside. Most devoted ballet dancers have deformed feet and toes due to their severe training. Deformities such as bunions, bunionettes, and hammer toes are common. Rey cannot remember how many toenails she has lost and regrown, and the healing process was heinous, she would have to tape and ice all her toes to prevent her digits from getting worse because she could not stop training altogether. 

Then she begins the slow process of bending her knees and putting on the toe pads - pouches that encapsulate and cushion the toes from the unyielding box and prevent friction that can cause blistering. 

She then puts on the shoes, pulls the elastic strings from the throats and ties them tightly, next she winds the ribbons around her ankles with bunny ears and tucks the ends inside the gaps, making sure they are nice and fit.

Only an amateur will actually tie those big loose bows around their calves, it will be a professional hazard when they actually dance.

Getting back to her old routine is actually quite soothing. She looks up when she finishes putting on the shoes.

[B-O-S-S: Thank you. Do you have a dance dress, a [tutu](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tutu_\(clothing\)) maybe?]

When people think about ballet dress, most of them will think about the Classical tutu, which is short and stiff, projecting horizontally from the waist and hip. Yeah, the sexy or the cute ones, most often worn by pre-teen baby dancers.

But Rey doesn't have that. All she has is a old Romantic tutu made of gauze and nylon, which is soft and bell-shaped, reaching the calf, and she has also got a camisole top to go with it - another gift from Maz.

She brings them out from the bottom of her small closet - out of the camera, she doesn't want to show him what her room actually looks like - and shows them to the camera, hoping he won't notice or criticize the creases on the soft fabrics.

[B-O-S-S: So delicate. Could you put them on please?]

Is this guy really into dance or is he fucking with her mind?

The point of a strip tease is "strip", but instead he keeps wanting her to put on MORE shoes and clothes. That is weird.

But at least she doesn't need to worry about showing him her genitals for the time being, so she gingerly put them on, and gives him a twirl. The hem of the skirt flutters and flares up like a flower.

[B-O-S-S: That's very graceful. Could you dance some more in your costume, please?]

Of course she can, but she hasn't danced en pointe for a while now. She flexes her feet and heels experimentally and moves the chair away.

She looks around again, calculating the size of the space. She can't do any traveling turns on one leg, so she decides to try a normal fouetté and then attitude, and then double en dehors. 

First, she moves both arms upward, en haut, Rey recalls what her teacher has instilled in her mind, the most basic technique:

Imagine she has got a piece of chalk and someone's drawn a line up her body right in the middle, cutting through the core, and when she dances, everything has to go back to the line.

Her arms, all the force, cannot go outwards, it has to go back in towards the line. Her leg has to stay in line with the line. Her hips have to stay up and they're gonna be evenly spaced between that line.

She has to focus on that one line the whole time. She has to keep her balance right in the middle, or her limbs will go all over the place, she may accidentally knocks the computer off the table. That is definitely something she doesn't want to happen.

Focus! 

And then she begins to turn - fouetté, attitude, en dehors and repeat, whipping her legs out and in, up and down, letting her muscle memory takes control of her body.

When she finishes the pirouettes with a soft landing, she can feel beads of sweat all over her forehead.

She hasn't dance that seriously for a while now. But she feels so liberating. She's still got it!

[B-O-S-S: Bravo! That is wonderful! You are truly amazing!]

The toothy smile she gives him is genuine. She likes to be praised for her hard work and skills, something that she actually deserves, not selling her body.

She stands with her left knee bent back, holding her left heel close to to her butt, stretches her quads and then alternates her knees while waiting for his next command.

What next?

She doesn't want to admit that she is getting excited from the anticipation.

So far, the man has done nothing but making sure she feels comfortable about herself by showering her with tokens and compliments. He is almost too good to be true.

And the man sends her a message after a few minutes of silence while she is doing a tendu.

[B-O-S-S: You are really lovely. I would love to spend more time with you. But something has come up, I have to go. Let's call it a night then? Good night, my dear Daisy.]

This is it? 

She can't believe her own eyes.

[SEXY_SC4V3NG3R: i had such a good time w/ u, good bye!]

She moves one foot backward, picks up the edge of her skirt, extends her arms and does a plié - giving him a ballet curtsy that is a very classic move after a successful show.

[B-O-S-S: What a sweet girl. Do you have an Amazon Wish List? I would love to send you some gifts.]

Is this guy even for real? Rich, kind, polite and generous. He is the whole package.

This is the first night she begins her camming career, and instead of taking off all her clothes, she has been asked to put on some more.

And she basically gets herself a sugar daddy?

The timing cannot be any more fortuitous.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've struggled with this chapter for a month, and in the end, I decided to tackle Ben's mental issues and motivation first, so there is no smut in this chapter, but I enjoy writing the ballet part, my папаша who handmade my first portable barre from scratch would be so proud. You go, Саша!
> 
> You may notice the writing style is slightly different, yes, because it's been a month and I have written two other stories and I feel like exploring different ways of speech.
> 
> The dance that Rey performs is [based on this video, starting from 1:07](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VqO4tpkiMLo&t=67s)
> 
> I'm a long-time MOOCer and enjoy fast-MOOCing. My mindset has been in a slump from August, so I actually took the course I mentioned here to help me to get out of my writer's block, I think you will understand it better once you read Kylo's part. 
> 
> But to be honest, seek professional help if you are depressed. The reason Kylo didn't go to a therapist is described in Seriousness's DL, I didn't alter this setting because it's a very important plot point.
> 
> Who do you think is u/peanutbuns? I think the answer is quite obvious, [who has buns that look like peanuts over her head, huh?](https://media1.popsugar-assets.com/files/thumbor/_vNNQGgKlJb-Pv6W_hQfcdDAons/fit-in/2048xorig/filters:format_auto-!!-:strip_icc-!!-/2017/02/10/849/n/1922283/1f435d0f55690a8a_edit_img_image_14344989_1486750953.jpg)
> 
> I have written [Not Bad At All](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14351400) which features the Darth Vader vacuum machine, Ballerina! Rey and the Solo twins having a threesome on the table, with foot play.
> 
> If you are into Daddy Kink, thumb-sucking, bed-wetting and watersports, go to Chapter 3 of [Beauty and the Beast.](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16168337) I am all about varieties.
> 
> Some of you may know that I have written [Rey Riding Hood (with Chikan Ben/Kylo)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16627502), yes, the one with Ballerina! Rey gets molested and raped by Chikan Ben/Kylo while riding the HOOD Line. There are a lot more French ballet glossaries in that story. Like I said in the end note of chapter 2, this is actually an AU of my AU, I think I have a whole multi-universe of Ballerina! Rey, but no matter what, Ben Solo/Kylo Ren will find her.
> 
> And I have also written [Lie Back and Think of Alderaan](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16506146), inspired by the Ophelia trailer, but basically just an excuse for me to write some crack about galactic domination, courtship fluff and wedding night smut. And yes, our BOSS has obvious foot fetish and they have a very sweet footsie in chapter three and explicit foot play in chapter four.
> 
> Now that I think of it, probably all the Ben Solo in my stories are into foot stuff. I may be the only Reylo that insists on writing foot fetish instead of ABO ones. Maybe foot stuff is my niche, LOL.
> 
> There is another CUNT hidden in this chapter, but they appear in the reverse order.  
> r/CamgirlProblems  
> r/Unixporn  
> r/NeverTellMetheOdds  
> r/Tinder
> 
> Pro bono: Latin, work undertaken voluntarily at no expense, such as public services. Often used of a lawyer's work that is not charged for. 
> 
> Bona Fide: Latin, literally "with good faith", genuine; real, without intention to deceive.

**Author's Note:**

> Feedback and kudos are much appreciated as they'll sure boost the ego of someone whose third language is English.  
> Even something like *asgsngwetuqpas* would make my day.  
> If you are not comfortable about publicizing your kink same, you can always choose to reply anonymously.
> 
> BTW, I have also written [Reylo Rapey Reveries](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16168178), [Super Soft Boy Ben Solo](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15586365) and [Double Dicks Ben Solo](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16102937) in case you need more kinky fixes.
> 
> 亲，走过路过看过赏个Kudos吧XD


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